


Cliff's Edge

by Book_Junkie



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Emotional Roller Coaster, Graphic Description of Corpses, Hurt Lance (Voltron), Keith/Lance (Voltron) Angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-11
Updated: 2021-02-11
Packaged: 2021-03-17 04:47:45
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,430
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29344602
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Book_Junkie/pseuds/Book_Junkie
Summary: Keith and Lance are fighting next to a cliff. A Galra soldier is seconds away from pushing Keith off the cliff, but before he does, Lance tackles him sending the Galra over. Unfortunately the Galra decided that if he was going down the Blue paladin was going down with him. Keith watches as the Galra pulls Lance down with him.
Comments: 5
Kudos: 18





	Cliff's Edge

Voltron got a distress signal from a planet that seemed to be made mostly of some sort of stone-like material. The terrain was odd with random drop-offs. There wasn't a lot of vegetation, leaving plenty of wide open space. The hardened stone-like material was a grayish-blue with silver speckles. Overall the planet was quite beautiful, if you ignored the village that was up in flames due to multiple bombs, and the Galra running around slaughtering the inhabitants. 

Keith and Lance were sent to the planet's surface to help protect the aliens there, while the rest fought off the Galra ships. Keith fought savagely, his anger growing increasingly at the sight of all the destruction. Keith ran out of the town, followed closely by some Galra. Keith's plan was to lure them away from the village, in order to give the aliens time to try fleeing. Keith unknowingly trapped himself between the Galra and the edge of a cliff.

Keith took down all of them except one that proved to be more resilient than the others. That said Galran was quick to kick out at Keith's feet, causing the red paladin to lose his balance. The Galran took that opportunity and shoved Keith over the edge. 

Keith quickly struck his sword out in time to drive it into the cliff, where there was a gap in the stone. He just barely managed to save himself from falling down the drop off.   
____

"I expected more from one of the paladins of Voltron. You're pathetic!" The Galran spat. "I would have loved to have had the chance to prolong your death. To have the opportunity to watch your life leave your fragile body. However, there are more immediate things I need to deal with that take priority. Enjoy the fall, Red Paladin," the Galran sneard, bringing his foot down onto Keith's hands.

"GET AWAY FROM HIM! IF YOU WANT TO HURT HIM THAN YOU'RE GONNA HAVE TO GET THROUGH ME FIRST!!" Lance screamed loudly, tackling the soldier before his foot made contact with Keith's hands. 

Both Lance and the Galran were thrown off the cliff's edge by the momentum created by Lance's tackle. Lance was able to catch himself, but the Galran grabbed a hold of Lance, weighing him down. Lance didn't have the strength to pull himself up with the Galran hanging off him.

Lance blinked rapidly, turning his stare over at Keith, desperate to memorize his face, to keep it close to his heart at all times. Keith tried offering a small smile, but while it was meant to provide encouragement, it only succeeded in stabbing at Lance's heart, filling it with grief.

Hissing at the strain that the weight of him and the Galran put on his arm, Lance called out. "Uhm K-Keith, you think you can pull yourself back over?!" 

"Lance, you idiot! What were you thinking!?" Keith was staring daggers at Lance but you could see the worry seeping through the corners.

"Well Keef, I wasn't exactly thinking. I just knew I had to save my favorite samurai from plummeting to his death." Lance attempted for a joke while squirming and kicking out at the Galran still hanging on.

An unnerving roar of laughter ripped through the air drowning out all other sounds with it's sheer volume. "I might have failed to dispose of the Red Paladin, but I'll be damned if I fall without taking one of you with me. VREPIT SA!" The Galran bellowed as he lashed out with his claws, stabbing them into Lance's abdomen and thigh. The claws slipped through like Lance was just a stick of melted butter.

Lance’s agonized, gasping screams filled the air as he was clawed. He kicked and twisted fruitlessly, fighting for purchase, grasping for escape. Blood splattered to the planet floor below when the leader tore his claws out with a sickening squelch, muscle twitching and splintered bone poking through. The Galran plunged it in again, this time aiming for Lance’s chest, and though it didn’t seem feasible, Lance screamed even louder.

"Keeeith, d-don’t watch,” Lance whimpered, and again a little louder when Keith didn’t comply. “K-Keith, d-d-don’t w-watch—” 

"Nooo-, Lance, hold on, I'm almost there!" Keith shouted as he continued in his struggle to pull himself up over the ledge, determined to get to Lance before it was too late.

Lance sought out Keith's distraught gaze. His heart shattering, pieces of it falling apart as he watched Keith in his desperate attempt to save him. Tears were leaking out of his eyes now, but he willed them back trying to give Keith his best smile. Lance struggled to squeeze as much love and happiness into what would be his last smile Keith would ever see from him. 

Lance then loses his grip and begins his free fall, letting gravity carry him down. Lance is surprisingly calm as he falls. He doesn't scream or cry. What would be the point in that? It wouldn’t change the outcome. Looking to the sky, he catches a glimpse of the Lions fighting off the last of the ships, and Lance's heart sinks a bit more. 'I wish I had the chance to tell my friends goodbye,' Lance thought before he let his eyes fall closed, keeping the smile on his face, and waited for death to take him. ‘It’s okay, I’m going home.’

"LANCE!!" Keith screamed, reaching out as he watched Lance's body collide with the stone... it’s too late.

"No, no, no, nonononononono." Keith could clearly make out the mangled mess created by both Lance and the Galran. 

Keith's screams were excruciating. "No, no, I-I, y-you weren't sup-p-posed to let go!! Why couldn't I get to you sooner?!" Biting into his arm to muffle the sounds of his screams, Keith curled up into himself once he made it back over the ledge. Steeling himself, Keith began his descent down the cliff.

"Ke- Keith can you hear me? What's going on? Are you and Lance ok? What's happening down there?"

Keith could just barely make out the sound of Shiro's voice coming through, too focused on the task before him. Keith gently laid his head against the ground, gathering Lance's injured body in his arms and holding him tight. His loud prayers went unheard, his rushed fingertips brushed through the other's tangled hair.

"No.." His voice slightly rises from a breathy shaky sigh to a high whisper. "Lance, please... please, you..." He uses his cracked speech, shaken enough to let his words hide in the back of his brain, not knowing what to do or say. Letting the moment fully sink in. Blood, the warm stickiness of it, could be felt seeping through his suit.

"Keith, I'm almost to your position, okay buddy?”

Around them was silence. The sounds of the battle were no longer audible, all the explosions, the blasts, and the screams went deaf to the dark-haired paladin's own ears. All he could hear was his own rapid frantic heartbeat, and Lance's non-existent one. 

The previous events kept replaying in Keith's mind. He looked down at his hands and noticed they were soaked in blood. He could still hear the nauseating sound Lance's body made as it met the hard stone. Hot tears streamed down his cheeks.

God there was so much blood. It covered everything like a sickness looking to spread its infection across the universe. Red was everywhere and for the first time in his life, Keith hated it with every ounce of his being.

Keith’s Galra-enhanced hearing managed to pick up a quietly muttered ‘shit’, signifying that Shiro has found them.

Shiro saw Keith’s body curled over Lance’s, quietly sobbing, muttering apologies under his breath. He told the others to go back to the Castle, refusing to let the others see the state their friend was in. Shiro then reached for Keith, pulling him from Lance's grotesque deformed corpse. He had to force down bile at the sight of Lance's blood, which seemed to stretch like melted cheese sticking to Keith's armor and skin.

"Sh-Shiro, I-i, OH MY GOD! H- he.. I tried, Shiro, I tried, I was too slow! I was too slow! Oh my god, Shiro, what have I done!" Keith spluttered, clinging to Shiro's chest.

"Keith, come on. We need to get you back to the Castle. I need to carry Lance, so I need you to walk on your own, alright kiddo? You think you can do that for me?" After receiving a short nod, Shiro slowly made his way around Keith and to Lance. A strangled cry was wrenched from his chest as he got a clearer view of Lance. Lance's body was a disgusting mangled mess. His bones had splintered and broken through his once perfectly smooth tan skin. blood stained his hair and armor a dingy red. The back of Lance’s skull had broken open on impact, splashing bits of brain matter across the stone floor like a monstrous abstract splatter painting. What made it worse was Lance's bright sea blue eyes staring sightlessly up at him with the widest softest smile Shiro had ever seen on Lance's face.

Shiro could only stare in shock at the heap of skin and bones before him that used to be their Lance McLain. Keith, on the other hand, continued forward silently. He grappled with the Galran's body that lay near Lance, hauling it away. Then, making his way back, Keith collapsed next to Lance once again, wrapping his hands around his body. Silent tears washed down his cheeks as he hugged the broken boy before him.

“I lo-oved you, I loved your b-beautiful eyes and y-your short hair a-and your stupid jokes. I love that you always d-did your best to make everyone happy, and I-i wished that you could have seen and believed how brilliant and loved you were. I-i loved everything about you e-except th-ere was al-always th-that one thing I h-hated about you. I-I hated that you n-never learned to save yourself. It was always save e-everyone, then if there w-was time you would get out.” His eyes filled with more and more tears, voice quavering as he finished that last sentence.

“I loved you, Lance. I never got to tell you, and I’m so fucking sorry. This isn’t the way it was supposed to happen, it’s not how anything was supposed to happen. We should’ve been on Earth, in the Garrison. We would still be rivals, until I couldn’t hide my crush for you anymore.” Keith shifted, wiping tears and blood from his face.

"I'm sorry, I'm so so so sorry. It's okay, you'll be ok. We'll make it all better, okay Lance? You just get some rest. When you wake up, you'll be as good as new." Keith repeated, falling into hysterics while he pulled Lance's cold dead body closer to him.

"K-Keith, he- he's gone. We need to get him back to the cas-"

"No!" Keith screeched, interrupting Shiro. "He's fine, he just passed out from a little blood loss and a concussion. H-he just needs a cryopod and some rest. Y-you'll see, h-he'll wake up and he'll be fine. He just needs sleep, okay Shiro? He just needs sleep."

"Okay, okay, Keith, alright, I believe you,” Shiro replied hesitantly. "Hey, Keith, how about I carry hi-"

"N-no! He's mine, I- I'll carry him." Keith held on to Lance's limp body as they made their way back to the castle.

Shiro managed to get Lance in a pod before anyone on the team could see his body. As the team made their way into the room, they could all tell by Shiro’s grim expression that something was up. Things were only confirmed when their eyes met the horrifying sight that was Keith Kogane. Keith was a disgusting mess of blood, dirt, and tears. On top of this revolting image, Keith's eyes were sunken in and full of death.

“Shiro, what's going on? Is Lance alright?” Allura questions, anxiety weighing heavily in her voice.

"Sh-Shiro, please tell me Lance is alright," Hunk begged.

“H-he didn’t make it. I’m sorry.” Shiro just shook his head as he watched both Pidge and Hunk break apart, letting out their screams of pain. Shiro soon joined them as he could not hold back his own emotions any longer. He just let his emotions pour out of him. After some time, Shiro picked himself up, wiping his tears away, listening to all the cries of anguish ring throughout the room, everyone reacting differently to the news.

“H-how di-did it happen?! What happened?! KEITH! You were there, what happened?!” Pidge called out in her distress.

Keith did his best to explain to them all what happened, but kept needing to stop and catch his breath or restrain his own cries of agony at reliving everything by retelling it.

Hunk ran to the pod, gasping for air like he was being strangled, tears streaming from wide, disbelieving eyes. Pitiful whimpers escaped him as his jaw shuddered and trembled. Lance’s lifeless eyes bore into him, and yet Hunk could not look away. He wailed and wept and howled until he gagged, and then he was forcefully expelling the contents of his stomach down his front. If it weren’t for the hands on either shoulder holding him upright, he’d have collapsed in a heaving fit. Allura and Coran helped get Hunk cleaned up and out of the room. Coran was the only to return.

“IT'S ALL YOUR FAULT!” Pidge screamed. “HE'S DEAD AND IT'S ALL YOUR FAULT!” She screamed again, increasingly louder than the last.

“I know,” he murmured.

Coran and Shiro ran over and restrained Pidge, who was acting like she was about to shred Keith to pieces.

“YOU COULD’VE SAVED HIM!!!” She squealed once more.

“I KNOW ALREADY!!” Keith shouted. Pidge looked taken aback, her small body shaking with huge tremors. More tears made their way down her flushed face and her body went slack. The two men dragged Pidge out. Keith sat back down on the bed and let the tears fall down to the floor.

“I’m sorry,” was whispered as Keith was left there alone.   
_______  
A few quintants went by, allowing everyone to calm down a bit from their initial shock. All of Voltron gathered around to say their goodbyes to Lance before Coran let the pod cremate him.

“Hopefully Lance will find his way back home.” The team looked at Keith and smiled softly.

“Yeah, and maybe we could visit him sometime.” Hunk added.

Keith smiled, knowing exactly where Lance's home was. 

The hot sandy beaches of Cuba.


End file.
